Pedal Cruise Control (PCC)

Abstract

A method of cruise control for a vehicle includes the following steps: checking for cruise conditions, determining whether the vehicle is in cruise control mode, and if in cruise control mode, maintaining and controlling the cruising speed of the vehicle until an exit signal is detected; checking the throttle deviation, whereby if not in cruise control mode, the throttle deviation is checked to determine throttle stability; checking cruising speed, whereby if conditions for throttle stability are met, the speed deviation of the vehicle is calculated, and the cruising speed is set; checking the cruising alert for drivers as well as drivers' actions, whereby if conditions for cruising have been met, issuing a cruise control prompt to the driver, and if it is detected that the driver has released the throttle pedal, entering the vehicle into cruise control mode; whereas if the driver fails to release the throttle within a certain period of time after cruise conditions have been met, the next check for cruise conditions is carried out. A system is provided to perform the method. A cruise control which is low-cost, requires no control buttons, and offers a simple product structure is achieved.

Description

PRIORITY CLAIM[0001]This application is based on and claims the 35 USC 119 foreign priority of Chinese Patent Application CN 201510833986.5 filed on 26 Nov. 2015, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0002]The present invention relates to a vehicle operating control technology, and more specifically to a system and method for automated cruise control.BACKGROUND INFORMATION[0003]Adaptive cruise control (ACC) and one-click cruise control (CC) functions currently on the market are commonly used in vehicles, wherein ACC functions requires a great many sensors, radar and imaging devices to detect the driving environment and the conditions around the vehicle body, with the need for determining the cruising speed being decided based on such detection results. One-click cruise control functions, on the other hand, require manual operation by drivers to enter cruise control.[0004]It is obvious that ACC is a semi-automatic driving mode; howe...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The present invention provides a method and system for cruise control that are low-cost, require no control buttons, and offer a simple product structure. The vehicle can enter cruise control without the driver being required to operate any buttons. The driver's intention with respect to cruise mode can be identified via the degree of throttle pedal depression and vehicle speed, with the driver's actions being checked. This simplifies the need for related hardware such as buttons and their corresponding circuits, thus providing a low-cost solution for vehicle cruise control.

Problems solved by technology

It is obvious that ACC is a semi-automatic driving mode; however, the high cost and complexity make it difficult for ACC, as an automatic cruise control mode, to be widely used in all models of vehicles, in particular low-cost, low-end models.

With one-click cruise control, a button manually controlled by the driver acts as the controller for input reference, and thus in this technical solution, several buttons must be specially provided on the steering wheel, which leads to extra costs; furthermore, the operation with this technical solution may prove difficult to less experienced drivers, which results in the function being used less frequently.

In summary, the market reach of the two methods of cruise control in the prior art is greatly limited by the two restrictive factors of cost and complexity of hardware.

Images